Conventional fuses are usually connected to an electric circuit by soldering the lead wires to the circuit or by mounting the fuse in a fuseholder. With increased and widespread use of miniaturized electric circuitries such as, e.g., PCB, there has developed increased interest in reducing the fuse size as much as practicable. The use of fuseholders or lead wires, however, contribute to increased fuse size, and hence, they detract from miniaturization of the fuse.
Recently, some fuses have been miniaturized to as small as 7 mm, which is approximately the size of electrical resistors with lead wires. However, these miniaturized fuses require lead wires and this contributes to the bulkiness of the fuse. Consequently, where more than one fuse must be used in the PCB, the increased overall fuse size limits the number of fuses which can be used in such circuitries.
While efforts have heretofore been made to miniaturize the electric fuses, these fuses still employ lead wires and fuseholders which limit the degree to which such miniaturization can be achieved.
Accordingly, it is an object of this invention to provide a miniature fuse uniquely suited for use in miniaturized electric circuitries.
It is a further object of this invention to provide a chip type fuse which, due to its unique construction, can be soldered directly to the PCB or the miniaturized electric circuit.
The foregoing and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will be appreciated from the following detailed description and the accompanying drawings.